The present invention relates to a flash camera or a combination of a camera and an electronic flash and more particularly a flash camera which may automatically set an optimum aperture depending upon the speed of the film used and upon whether or not the electronic flash is used and which may be set manually to a long-distance focusing for photographing a subject a relatively long-distance from the camera or to a close-up or short-distance focusing for taking a subject at a relatively short-distance away from the camera.
There have been recently devised and demonstrated various cameras capable of loading a film cartridge and incorporating an electronic flash. There have been also become available various types of cartridges loaded with high-speed films. Therefore the film cartridge type cameras of the type described above have been so constructed and arranged as to select an aperture depending upon the speed of a film loaded. More particularly, the camera may be set to an aperture A when a cartridge loaded with a film of ASA 100 (DIN 21) (to be referred to as "the low-speed film"), but when a film cartridge loaded with a film of ASA 400 (DIN 27) (to be referred to as "the high-speed film") is loaded, the camera may be set to an aperture B which is smaller than the aperture A. With the high-speed film and the small aperture, the depth of focus may be increased.
In case of a flash exposure with a high-speed film, when a selected aperture is equal to an aperture selected when a low-speed film is loaded, the depth of focus or a focusable range is increased as compared with the case using a low-speed film. However, when a high-speed film is loaded, the aperture is automatically set smaller so that the focusable range is not increased in practice, whereby the advantages of a high-speed film are not obtained.
Some cartridge type cameras are provided with a focus scale operatively coupled to a lens focusing mechanism so that the distance to a focused subject may be read or with a focus scale plate merely attached to the camera body. With the focus scale merely graduated with distances, erratic reading very frequently occurs. With the focus scale which indicates a distance to a focused subject, the change in focusable range or depth of focus with the use of the electronic flash or a high-speed film cannot be displayed so that a user cannot take into consideration various exposure factors which change due to the change in depth of focus.